PoA 5, innocent RL

[Amy Z]

No: HPFGUIDX 18829

Re: Why Remus was on the train

I'm surprised by how many listies think a major reason Remus was on 
the train was to protect Harry from the Dementors.  It makes sense 
given that he's Hogwarts's DADA expert, but otherwise, this never 
occurred to me.  Do you think Dumbledore knows that Harry is going to 
be affected by Dementors more strongly than most students?  How would 
he or anyone know that Harry has buried memories of his parents' 
deaths?  Or are you saying that given Dumbledore's dislike of the 
Dementors, and his fear that they would search the train at some 
point, he wanted Remus there for the sake of =all= of the students?

I assumed that insofar as Remus is a plant and not just traveling by 
train because he's ill/poor, he's there to guard against Sirius.  The 
MOM has made sure Harry is accompanied by adult wizards ever since 
Sirius's escape, and it would make sense that Fudge et al would 
ask Dumbledore to ask one of his staff to be on the train to keep an 
eye on things.  It could be any of them, but it's Remus because of his 
other reasons to use the train, and/or because Dumbledore wants him to 
know that he trusts him to be on the right side despite his friendship 
with Sirius.  Assigning him the job of protecting Harry from Sirius 
would be a very Dumbledorean way to convey that trust.

Maybe I'm just stuck in those moments when the book was still 
unfolding for me for the first time (I always wish I could relive that 
with my favorite books) and I didn't know there was anything for Harry 
to fear except Sirius Black, so I assumed that that was why the 
professor was there.  (Either that or for some nefarious purpose.  I 
thought he was a very suspicious character.  For one thing, I was 
going by the dictum, "Never trust a DADA professor any farther than 
you can throw him."  Then there was all that improbable sleeping, and 
then handing out chocolate to make nice . . . even the gentle voice 
Jim Dale gave him couldn't assuage my suspicions.)

Now, however, I start hyperventilating when someone suggests Lupin 
might go over to the Death Eaters.  Never!  Not my Remus!  IMO Sirius 
never had good reason to suspect him of being the spy; it was a case 
of understandable paranoia, combined with "who else could it be?," 
perhaps combined with suspicious-seeming innocent behavior that we 
don't know about (could be anything--unexplained absences, getting 
caught looking through James and Lily's medicine chest, whatever).

Amy Z
who doesn't take this stuff personally or anything weird like that, oh 
no